The lost word

David Brooks in today's article , talks about well - take a guess,  "humility", a lost word in this country. Its about time someone spoke about it since its been out of the American lexicon for a while now.


The scene and mood of the nation after defeating the Nazi's says what made this country unique and great: (NPR broadcast)


"On V-J Day, Frank Sinatra appeared, along with Marlene Dietrich, Jimmy Durante, Dinah Shore, Bette Davis, Lionel Barrymore, Cary Grant and many others. But the most striking feature of the show was its tone of self-effacement and humility. The allies had, on that very day, completed one of the noblest military victories in the history of humanity. And yet there was no chest-beating. Nobody was erecting triumphal arches."


"This subdued sentiment seems to have been widespread during that season of triumph. On the day the Nazi regime fell, Hal Boyle of The Associated Press reported from the front lines, The victory over Germany finds the average American soldier curiously unexcited. There is little exuberance, little enthusiasm and almost none of the whoop-it-up spirit with which hundreds of thousands of men looked forward to this event a year ago.”


And this great country has been sinking and almost reached the abyss these days in a self centered rhetoric:


"Today, immodesty is as ubiquitous as advertising, and for the same reasons. To scoop up just a few examples of self-indulgent expression from the past few days, there is Joe Wilson using the House floor as his own private “Crossfire”; there is Kanye West grabbing the microphone from Taylor Swift at the MTV Video Music Awards to give us his opinion that the wrong person won; there is Michael Jordan’s egomaniacal and self-indulgent Hall of Fame speech. Baseball and football games are now so routinely interrupted by self-celebration, you don’t even notice it anymore.


This isn’t the death of civilization. It’s just the culture in which we live. And from this vantage point, a display of mass modesty, like the kind represented on the V-J Day “Command Performance,” comes as something of a refreshing shock, a glimpse into another world. It’s funny how the nation’s mood was at its most humble when its actual achievements were at their most extraordinary."

How did this happen? Its not something that happens overnight but collective social system tries to sneak into us and we take it for granted as an evolutionary trait. The innated talented "heros" of this generation, most of the outliers and the leaders tend to look forward for instant gratification. Common masses who these creatures as demi-gods, try to emulate their successes (in vain) sans the talent and hard work. With no sense of introspection they get caught in this infinite loop and the sense of social responsibility collapses. The boisterous litany not only gives them a false sense of amelioration but reinstates their beliefs like a gambling addict.  
In this process they tend to lose the golden goose , the plasticity of the brain or worse, making it malleable in a parochial sense.
Humility comes for someone who has a worldly outlook, realizes there will be tomorrow and invests in dedicated long term responsibility. They concur the obviousness that no one in the history has reached the top alone. Humility oozes naturally into the system with such a progressive mindset. Who could someone make people understand this obvious truth? I wish, I knew.

People have to change for themselves for their own good. Instead we have become a dopamine driven nation. Thanks to Max for the constant flow of Oxytocin which is saving me from becoming the man I despise.